What of Rupert Sheldrake?

This piece is a bit afield for me. I am embedding a “banned TED Talk” given by Rupert Sheldrake, a Cambridge, Harvard educated, scientist and bane of the scientific community. What of Rupert Sheldrake?

He is not necessarily a Christian, though he reportedly says the Our Father every day. Dr. Sheldrake “evolved” from a biochemist and cell biologist and later to a plant physiologist to researcher in the field of parapsychology,[5] known for his “morphic resonance” concept.[6]He is the darling of the New Age adherents, not Christians. He is also labeled a “heretic” by his scientific fellows.

So why would I include the subject on Christian orientated blog site? The answer is that this scientific heretic is a heretic (of science) because science, as it has evolved into the 21st Century, is exactly what Dr. Sheldrake claims: dogmatic. Dogma is not just the province of religious belief; it is also the stuff of which scientific belief is made. Yes, scientific belief.

The statement, “it’s science”, is a dogmatic conversation stopper. People assert science dogmatically when conversation strays from what the scientific community currently accepts as true, and the assertion of science shuts the door on further discussion.

C.S. Lewis made the same point a generation ago when he spoke of the “Scientific Myth“. Lewis would agree with Sheldrake, though they may not have shared the same faith, that science is not very self aware of its own biases. These biases are, ironically, unscientific.

Lewis would take it a step further and say that science, as it has come to be defined and practiced in modern times, cannot even account for itself. The rational materialist cannot account for the reason on which it depends and owes its allegiance. (See Is Theology Poetry?)

With those thoughts in mind, it is a bit entertaining to hear Rupert Sheldrake take on the community of which he is a part, or at least once was, and which now shuns him. He counts down 10 dogmas to which the scientific community clings.

After listening to the “banned TED Talk” by Rupert Sheldrake, take some time to listen to him discuss the banning of his TED Talk and the scientific dogmas that reveal a belief system among scientists.